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10/21/2013

Clean energy voter guide launches

Environmental protection advocates are gearing up for an active session in the Virginia General Assembly and they are making an aggressive push to get push to get like minded politicians elected this fall.

The non-partisan VA Advanced Energy Industries has just launched an online voter guide that polls current candidates on a series of questions related to the future of clean technology.

The guide doesn't specifically put full support behind one candidate or the other, but it lists in plain launguage where candidates stand on issues like tax credits for renewable energy use, the repeal of the hybrid car tax fee, and access for green energy technology in the current utility market.

The goal is to give voters concerned about the future of clean energy an easy to find resource when it comes to picking a candidate.

We sat down with Francis Hodsoll from the VA Advanced Energy Industries PAC who is heading up their effort.

Here is more on what the group hopes to accomplish with their web site:

While VA Advanced Energy guide itself does not specifically endorse local candidates, the group has hosted an event for the Democratic nominee Terry McAuliffe, where they did endorse him.

Republicans argue that they are closely intertwined with some big money groups that have specifically targeted attacks at the GOP nominee Ken Cuccinelli. Hodsoll and his partners Mike Healy and Tony Clifford sent an e-mail to supporters that called Cuccinelli a "climate-change denier" who is on the "wrong side of almost every enviornmental issue".